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Gimmicks Will Not Address the Dire Situation of Our Roads and Bridges

Washington, D.C. (June 2, 2014) – Terry O’Sullivan, General President of LIUNA – the Laborers’ International Union of North America – made the following statement today regarding the proposal by some House Republicans to patch the Highway Trust Fund:

The idea of robbing the U.S. Postal Service to provide another duct-tape fix to our nation’s critical transportation infrastructure would damage both Americans who rely on the mail service and those who want safe roads and bridges.

Gimmicks will not address the dire situation of our roads and bridges.

Congress has several responsible, viable options before it. The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee has passed a bi-partisan Highway Bill that would stabilize the Highway Trust Fund for six years. The U.S. Transportation Department has proposed a four-year plan. And Oregon Rep. Earl Blumenauer has filed a bill which would stabilize the fund for 10 years through an incremental 15-cent gas tax increase. Each proposal would not only be a step toward making our roads and bridges safer, they would create and protect hundreds of thousands of jobs.

Robbing the Postal Service to provide inadequate transportation investment would not only threaten nearly 100,000 Postal jobs – the uncertainty it would create in the construction industry would forego the creation of hundreds of thousands of good construction jobs.

The American people want responsible action. They understand that we must invest in fixing crumbling roads and aging bridges. Opinion survey after opinion survey show that the American public will support paying for safe roads and bridges, including through a modest gas-tax increase. Kicking the can down our pothole-filled roads is a recipe for further decline.